


From Here to There

by kennedygailparker



Series: The Journey of Wells and Roads [2]
Category: The West Wing
Genre: F/M, Lovers to Friends to Lovers, Post-Series, Sexual Situations, Spoilers: Season 7, The Journey of Wells and Roads Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-27 04:50:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20942546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kennedygailparker/pseuds/kennedygailparker
Summary: The Journey of Wells and Roads Universe. Toby calls C.J. four weeks after baby Lillian comes into the world. He dreams about what he would do in Danny’s place.





	From Here to There

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Journey of Wells and Roads](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20657867) by [kennedygailparker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kennedygailparker/pseuds/kennedygailparker). 

> A/N: I recently wrote and posted a fic The Journey of Wells and Roads. I thought no one was reading it and as I was coming to terms with having written it just for myself, I discovered that people were reading it. It’s a wonderful feeling. a huge 'thank you' to everyone who commented and encouraged me.
> 
> I received this prompt by yesmadamepresident:
> 
> Okay since you said you’re looking for prompts, and kind of inspired by a line from The Journey of Wells and Roads (although probably not in the same universe): CJ and Toby are together and CJ, either pregnant or recently postpartum, is insecure about her body and Toby reassures her. I’m a sucker for insecurity followed by validation :)
> 
> Even though she mentioned that it may not be set in the same universe of The Journey of Wells and Roads, I set it then anyway. It does not require you to have read The Journey of Wells and Roads but it may make more sense if you have read it. This piece takes place during the beginning of The Journey of Wells and Roads. 
> 
> P.S. This piece was not beta-ed. I would love to have someone beta it (and my other stories), I know a couple people have let me know they would be interested. If that's still you, please comment below and tell me how I can get in touch with you. You can also leave me a note on tumblr, I'm seekennedywrite .
> 
> P.P.S yesmadamepresident , thank you so much for this prompt! I’m not sure this fic is quite what you were looking for so I’m writing you two!! The second one will be a little lighter and is not set in The Journey of Wells and Roads universe. I hope to post it soon! Thank you, thank you, thank you. It was so great to be inspired to write! I'm always open for more prompts, especially from you!
> 
> P.P.P.S Someone sent me a shout out and asked requested a more explicit version of the sex scene in The Journey of Wells and Roads. That scene is about as much as you can expect from me for now BUT if someone wants to remix that sex scene into something steamy and post it, I'd read it! The invitation is open to all!
> 
> -Kennedy

_ **From Here to There** _

“C.J,” Toby says into his cell phone, clearing his throat to remove the edge of want he finds has crept into his voice, “how are you?”

They’d been doing a good job at calling each other and staying in touch but the last several months of her pregnancy had coincided with the end of the semester and the release of his second children’s book, the business of their lives paired with the difference in time zones had made it difficult to get in touch with one another. It’s the first time he’d gotten a hold of her since she’d had the baby. Carol had emailed them all pictures of baby  _ Lillian Rose Concannon, 8 pounds 6 ounces, 18 inches, born May 6th at 11:58 AM _ . One of them was a glamour shot of baby Lillian with her little nose scrunched up, swaddled up in a pink blanket decorated with little flamingos. A second picture showed C.J. smiling proudly at the camera with baby Lillian cradled to her chest. Toby had mailed her a gift (a leather bound baby book with Lillian's name embossed on the cover ), but they hadn’t spoken in the four weeks since she’d had the baby. He’d taken a chance on his way home from work and dialed her number.

“C.J.?” 

Toby holds the phone closer to his ear to hear more clearly. He can make out what sounds like a plaintive cry from Lillian. He sets his briefcase by the door and steps around the packing boxes he still has yet to unload. He’d moved into the brownstone a month prior when he decided to make his stay at Columbia permanent, but still had yet to unpack more than the basics. The kids were coming to stay with him in a couple weeks, so he knew he’d spend the weekend un-packing.

“Sorry Toby. I’m here. How are you?” C.J. asks, her voice warm and tired. 

The sound of her voice hits him like a ton of bricks. For a moment, he’s overwhelmed by the urge to be with her. He’d become accustomed to working beside her, seeing her every day, sharing dinner with her more nights than not. It’d been a hard adjustment when he’d left the white house and harder still when she’d moved across the continent to California. Being removed from his colleagues was not something Toby wanted to bother him, but it had. He’d found solace in his writing. 

His first book, a brick of non-fiction about the Declaration of Independence and punctuation and bias, had been derived from the temporary madness of having nothing to do but drown in his own guilt and anger. The book he’d published for Molly had come from the warmth and love he had for his daughter and the curiosity and imagination he saw in her eyes. The book he’s published for Huck had been inspired by a failed attempt at youth soccer and Huck’s ever growing love for baseball. The volume he’d just started writing, the stack of pages currently sitting on his desk, was coming from somewhere else - hindsight maybe - but he wasn’t sure. The novel in progress felt unmoored like it didn’t have a center or a direction. Toby wasn’t sure he was going to finish it.

“Good. I’m good,” Toby says, “how are you?” he prompts again. 

C.J. exhales against the receiver, Toby finds himself wishing he could feel her breath across his cheek, “I’m fine,” she says, “tired.” Something is wrong. He can hear it in her voice. Her words are clogged and wet like she’s been crying.

“You sure?”

She sniffles. Toby can picture her lifting the back of her hand to her eyes before brushing her bangs across her forehead in agitation. It was a move he’d seen her do when emotions got the best of her in the West Wing. She doesn’t like to seem weak. He lets the silence stretch between the two of them like an offering. She’ll talk to him when she’s ready. 

He’d planned to heat up dinner and watch the rest of the Knicks game before climbing into bed but the unexpected weight of his current phone call requires something stronger. He crosses into the kitchen and makes himself of glass of scotch. The hiss and cracking of ice under alcohol drowns out the last of C.J.’s sniffles. 

“Lillian doesn’t want to take a bottle,” she says finally, “but she doesn’t like breast feeding much either. It’s just been weeks of,” she trails off, “Danny decided to go back to work. Never trust a reporter. So I’m looking for preschools but she has to be taking a bottle at six weeks to be accepted, and now I can’t find a clean shirt anywhere,” she finishes with a wry chuckle, “I feel like my skin doesn’t fit anymore.” Her voice is wet again when she finishes. 

Toby remembers Donna’s bright smile and delight at being photographed beside Josh and mentioned in a magazine and the tight set to C.J.’s features when she was mentioned, usually ridiculed for her hair cut or her height.  _ “It’s easier when you’re young and blonde.”  _ There’d been articles speculating she was a man and many more speculating that she was gay. He’d committed treason and still been trumpeted. The world was harder for her than it was for him. The world was harder for women and girls.

“Huck would still take a bottle now if we let him. Molly spit up more than she drank.”

“Was that meant to be comforting ? If so you’re really bad at it.”

“I’ve been accused of worst.”

C.J.’s retort is interrupted by Lillian’s crying. It’s both loud and pitiful in Toby’s ear.

“Give me just a minute.”

“If now is a bad time -”

“No,” C.J. says firmly before softening her voice, “it’s nice to talk to another adult. Danny’s overseas, an old friend called in a favor. Some reporter I’ve never heard of, Karen Wells,” She says. The lightness in her tone is forced.

Toby doesn’t comment. The balance between them is delicate. Seven years in the White House had helped them craft their relationship into something that worked. Then he’d left and sent her to be with her now husband. Commenting on Danny’s lack of involvement was the type of thing that lead to him telling her the truth, that lead to admitting he made a mistake, that lead to upsetting the balance. Some nights he wondered if the time would come to be honest, if it would make a difference. Now, when she was tired and lonely and teary eyed, wasn’t that time.

Toby hears static for a moment, the shutting of a door, the rustle of fabric and C.J.’s hiss. He imagines she’s pulling on a fresh shirt from the laundry. 

When her voice comes back over the line, its hushed. “ _ Talk to me,”  _ she says, her tone a little desperate. He tells her about his summer classes, then about Molly’s current obsession with space, and Huck’s failed attempt at soccer ( _ “He seems to prefer baseball.”)  _ She berates him for not letting her review his book ( _ “You let Josh have his name on the dust cover.” _ ) and complains about finding Lillian a preschool  _ (“I can name all the current senators but can’t tell if some of these are curriculums or foreign nations.”)  _ Toby finishes his glass of scotch and a second. C.J. almost drifts off as their phone call reaches the one hour mark. 

“The library is coming along. Are you...coming to the dedication?” She asks carefully.

“Yeah.” The ‘I don’t know’ is clear in his voice. “You’ll be there?” the  _ with Danny  _ goes unsaid.

“Mhmm,” C.J. confirms, “I’m hoping to fit into my own skin by then. I thought I’d stop seeing myself on  _ Capital Beat,  _ when I left the capital.” The joke falls flat.

She tells him goodbye to give another attempt at feeding Lillian. Her voice is still shaky at the end of their call. She doesn’t belong to him but Toby can’t help but want to wrap her up in a blanket, lead her head to his shoulder, tangle his fingers in her hair, and press a kiss against her temple. 

He falls asleep soon after he hangs up. 

It’s not the first time she appears in his dreams and he knows it won’t be the last. 

She stands in front of his full length mirror, studying her toes, her head drops forward so her hair shields her face. He presses a kiss against her shoulders before kneading them with his hands. She hums at the sensation. Her sleepy smile is like a punch to the gut. 

“I’m right here.” Toby promises. 

“Mhhmm,” C.J. closes her eyes and sways towards him.

He traces her spine with calloused fingers that make her shiver. Her head tilts back against him. His beard scratches against her jaw. He traces her arms from her shoulders to her fingers and holds her hands in his. They’re cold to the touch. He puts teasing words in her ear,  _ “you need to do something about your circulation.” _

He wants the words to tell her what she looks like in this moment. She is strong and vulnerable, cold and gentle. She is beautiful and he is drunk on her. He has been for over a decade if he’s being honest. 

He doesn’t know how to say it in a way she will believe.

His words fail him but he shows her that she is beautiful. He traces the outside of a swollen breast with a gentle barely there touch.

“Shh. Easy Jeanie, I’ve got you,” he promises when she eases away from his hand. He drops to his knees in front of her. He worships her thighs, traces the scar of her c-section with licks and kisses.  _ “You are strong,”  _ he kisses into her skin,  _ “you are beautiful,”  _ his voice is husky when he adds,  _ “I am thankful for you,”  _ his lips soft against her stomach.

He runs his hands over her thighs and makes her laugh by tickling behind her knee. It’s too early for sex, she’s sore and tired and still healing. Sex isn’t the point. 

She looks at the mirror, studies the two of them - her long lithe body, his cheek pressed against her stomach - and smiles.

He wakes up bereft.

He finds the novel’s compass. He spends the weekend writing instead of unpacking. He’s on his final draft, months later, when they see each other at the library dedication. 

She hugs him when she sees him. Her hair is darker and longer than when he last saw her. Her shoulders curve forward more often than they used to, as if she’s guarding herself. They’re ushered away from the motorcade and C.J. talks to him while they walk. She tells him about how curious Lillian is ( _ “She wants to explore. She wants to touch everything”) _ , about Tummy time ( _ “She’s so frustrated that she can’t crawl. She gets this little furrow between her brows) _ , and about how she’s been using Lillian’s blocks to draft out roads for her next project in Kundu ( _ “Lillian loves it. She’s already trying to build her own roads. We need to invest in some of the road pieces that connect like train tracks. All Lillian’s blocks are pink. Why are girls toys always pink.”) _ .

Donna rushes C.J. at the reception, pulls her into a hug and crows over how handsome a couple she and Danny make. Toby only notices the careful distance between C.J. and Danny, close enough to be inconspicuous, far enough that it means something. 

C.J. presses a kiss to Toby’s cheek in goodbye when he helps her into the car. She arranges her dress so that the fabric falls in folds that shield her stomach. He can’t help but send a raised eyebrow in Danny’s direction.  _ What are you doing to remind her that she’s strong? What are you doing to remind her that she’s beautiful?  _

“I’m finishing a new book,” Toby says, shoving his hands into his pockets, “you may not like it,” he chuckles and grins self-deprecatingly, “ I’ll send you a copy.” 

“Okay.” C.J. says skeptically. 

Toby watches their car pull away before pulling a notebook out of his pocket. In a few moments he’s sketched out his next children’s book. 

_ To a little girl I hope to one day know, may you color outside the lines, just like your mother. _

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think - comments and prompts appreciated. Tumblr - seekennedywrite


End file.
